The Fugitive

My mother was a member of the Resistance during the war and also never spoke about it. Thank you, Mr. Kolker, for your moving story and how it has also helped me better understand how she must have felt then and me now.

Adjectives seem inadequate. Not just for the man on the run, but for the people who risked their own lives to help him. Without putting too fine a point on it, the Nazis generally tortured and killed citizens who were found to have helped resistance fighters.

Incredible story, and very well-written. Much praise to the author.

What we must not miss is that Jan's survival depended on, and gave new meaning to, the lives of all those Norwegians who sacrificed for him to have a chance. Jan's personal trauma may sit more in him feeling his life's arc did not justify their sacrifice. But it was his enabling their sacrifice that ennobled the escape and generates justifiable pride in all Norwegians to celebrate his survival and certainty of their sacrifice should the opportunity present.

A very interesting and dramatic story of the heroic efforts of the people of Norway and the hero that gave them a pride in their nation that will live forever. When we look at the youth of America today, I can only hope we have the same steadfastness to persevere like Balustrade and his courageous protectors.

I am proud, again, to have Norwegian blood in my veins (my mother's mother). The taciturn quality seems to run deep. We need to give Donald Trump a Norweigian blood transfusion.

When I read We Die Alone, I was particularly struck by the actions of the people who decided to help him. It's one thing to be brave, strong, and dedicated to the Resistance yourself, but quite another to also decide to risk the deaths of your spouse and children. These people must have been made of the same stuff as Thor's hammer.

We must of course forgive, but we must also never forget, it was the wily neutral Swedes who granted safe passage to the Nazi troops for their full-on invasion and occupation of Norway.

Stories like this make me wonder if on the one hand I would have the courage while on the other why men subject others to such pain.

At some level I am beginning to understand how the concepts of good and evil take the form of heaven and hell.

Jan Baalsrud denied death and embraced life. He is, like Mr. Kubicek, a hero.

Thank you for this story. The Norwegians I have known (fishermen all) were the toughest men I have ever met. And also the men who were the hardest to know, because they were so private. I have the utmost respect for all Norwegians because of them.

This issue of the magazine is one of the most fascinating collection of adventures I have ever read. Thank you NYT!

Wonder article & the Howarth book is a wonderful read. another wonderful story of Norwegian heroism is the children's book Snow Treasure--not just for children; adults will find it a good read

Thanks for telling this story! We should never forget heroes like Baalsrud and the many who helped save him. It's one more reminder that those Scandinavians are tough hombres. My best friend married a guy from Arendal, Norway who was a boy during WWII. He used to tell the story of a British pilot who had crashed near Arendal in the early 1940s. The folks in Arendal found him and, although the Nazis occupied the town, the natives hid the pilot for the duration of the war - moving him to a different house each night to avoid detection. Imagine that! An entire town keeping this huge secret for years! And then there were the Danes, who managed to protect and smuggle almost their entire Jewish population out of Denmark to neutral Sweden in late 1943. This is one reason why I am so captivated by World War II. The horror and evil of it spawned true heroics from all kinds of people, some of them very unlikely. It warms the soul to read about such people.

Incredible is a huge understatement regarding Jan Baalsrud's experience. Thank you for bringing his, and his rescuers' story, to us.

The great irony is how war seems to bring out the best and the worst of humanity. What Baalsrud endured and what his protectors risked was repeated over and over again all over Europe and in the Pacific.

What a story of resistance and resilience. I was two months old when the Germans invaded my town, Arendal, Norway, and have often read about the praise world leaders gave Norwegians for their courage and self sacrifice during World War Two.
The fight for freedom and liberty can be perilous and treacherous!

I am survivor of six German concentration camps, but my tale is a but a cakewalk compared to this one. This one is beyond belief!

Peter Kubicek
Author of "Memories of Evil"